WW1

Last Thursday Michael brings to our club his new rules for the naval battles. He called it Big Guns! We all love play naval battles with big ships, especially those from the first half of the 20th century. Sadly all rules known by us are mostly overcomplicated, especially with a lot of paperwork, tables etc. It is not good for the club game, especially when it comes to the end of that (especially when your club shares the roof with a pub ;). So we needed something simple and quick. Michael reduced the ships factors to the 4 elements: hull strength, speed, command and gunpower. Depends on the navy, type of the ship those factors would vary. He also introduced the rules for submarines, which are some kind of novum for the games played by me (I don't remember if I ever played with submarines on the table). Michael idea was: until the submarine stays on the surface it behave as other ships, but as soon it goes underwater, we have to mark its movement on the pice of paper. It is very simple: we mark the direc

As I mentioned in my last posting, during my recent trip with my wife to the UK and Europe, I was able to fit in a day at the Partizan Wargames Show in Newark.
This was actually the second British wargaming show I’ve visited, as back in 2013 I was lucky enough to attend SELWG in London. Based on that previous experience, I had some idea of what to expect. But despite this fore-knowledge, the sight of so many incredibly impressive games at Partizan was a real eye-opener to this colonial boy!
The show was held in a very roomy and light venue at the Newark Showgrounds. I arrived just before opening time, and there was already a queue at the door. At 10.00 exactly the doors opened and the line moved quickly as the entry formalities were carried our efficiently by the organisers (including giving the first 500 visitors – including yours truly – a specially commissioned 28mm figure of the famous inter-war revolutionary, Rosa Luxembourg).
I spent the next six hours happily wandering round the ha

Hi! It was a long time, since my last post. I'm quite busy right now as I'm looking for a new home and that takes a lot of my free time. Until I will not solve that problem, my posts will be much shorter, than usual. Sorry about that. Today two games we recently had. First was War of the Rings and the second Muddy CoC. Witam! Upłynęło trochę czasu od mojego ostatniego posta. Jestem ostatnio bardzo zajęty, a to dlatego że szukam nowego mieszkania. Zajmuje mi to prawie cały wolny czas. Do czasu, aż nie rozwiążę tego problemu, moje posty bedą niestety krótsze, niż zazwyczaj. Bardzo Was za to przepraszam. Dzisiaj dwie ostatnie gry. Pierwsza to War of the Rings, druga to Muddy CoC.1. The Battle of Three Armies. Bitwa trzech armii.SCENARIO/SCENARIUSZ: Alasdair WatsonUMPIRING/PROWADZENIE GRY: Alasdair WatsonSCENERY/SCENERIA: SESWCFIGURES & MODELS/FIGURKI I MODELE: Alasdair WatsonDwarfs and Elves.The Enemy.In this game, the join forces of Dwarfs and Elves (me) stand up against forces of S

We had 7 guys out at the club this week with three games on deck. Jonathan and Scott played some Commands and Colors Machine Guns.I think this was the Verdun scenario, with the Germans advancing over the Meusse River? I left before it was done, but it looks like the Germans were just running out of troops.Dan hosted Terry and Richard in a game of Strange Aeons. RCMP and heroes versus cultists.The cultists were selling some naked townies for meat to some little guys with big teeth. Gravel Road Cowboys had to rescue them.I left before this game reached conclusion. At that point, the body count looked like it was favouring Sergeant Preston and his kung-fu fighters.A very pretty game that Dan did a nice job of putting on.Chen and I played Battlestar Galactica with Newtonian movement. BSG is basically the same as Wings of War (movement on cards, simultaneous selection) and you can play it with cinematic movement or with Newtonian rules.Newtonian movement allows you to pivot your ship away from your direction of tr

At 6.00 p.m. on Sunday 2 August 2018, Sir Peter Jackson’s The Great War Exhibition, including the massive Chunuk Bair diorama that I was so involved with back in 2015, closed its doors for the last time.
The Great War Exhibition was designed as a temporary exhibition, to be kept open for the duration of the First World War centenary, and to close some time after the November 11th Armistice Day ceremony in 2018.
Featured in the exhibition was a huge diorama of the battle that took place at Chunuk Bair on the Gallipoli peninsula in 2015. Around 140 wargamers from all over New Zealand worked in a team effort to paint the 5,000 specially made 54mm Perry Miniatures figures.
You can read all about this complex project in this downloadable Wargames Illustrated article.
Fellow wargamer, and one of the project heads for the exhibition, Rhys Jones, attended the formal closing ceremony, where he spoke to the invited guests about the creation of the exhibition, including the diorama.
“The good news is that

Our Centenary of Remembrance WW1 gaming continued this week with the Germans clearing out a French Trench system after a successful dawn assault, while a French rearguard desperately holds them off to buy time for the Regiment to withdraw. I adopted a scenario from Too Fat Lardies' Stout Hearts and Iron Troopers supplement and kept with To The Last Man rules from last week. I had the French start hidden and gave each team written orders to keep a few things hidden from eachother. It added a bit of tension which was fun.
The Germans moved up with their two squads and HMG team, while the French held their fire. The Germans, unsure of what awaited them in the now seemingly empty French trenches, advanced cautiously, throwing grenades around corners (and taunting the French players to open up on them if they dare!).
And when the opportune time came, the first French HMG team opened up!
On the other flank, the veteran German squad found the trench ahead of them blocked

All I can say about this amazing place is if you are interested in Naval History and you haven't visited yet GO , really this is the place for Royal Navy Buffs .Amongst the many things to see are HMS Victory ,Nelsons flag ship at Trafalgar ,a really fascinating ship it took us about an hour and a half to walk round and listen to the facts abiout the ship ,Nelson and the battle ,beware of aa stiff neck though once we got below decks I was stooped all the time ,there is also the Nelson museum to visit. nearby is HMS M33 the last surviving ship that fought at Gallipoli .HMS Warrior 1860 at the time the largest ,fastest and most powerful ship in the world .Until December this year there is agreat exhibit "36 hours Jutland 1916 " this alone is worth the visit .There are many exhibits and museums plus attractions for the kids ,take the water bus to Gosport for the subamarine musem and a harbour tour around the modern Royal Navy ships and the Napoleonic forts . A few tips if you are going buy the full na

Some players get right into character to make the most of the experience
After a number of us scored some painted WW1 troops from the MOAB bring and buy, we were keen to throw down and get them onto the table.
French Infantry advance along the trenches
France, 1916. Sometime after dinner.
German Jager HMG team
Für das deutche Vaterland!
The new stahlhelm proved most popular amongst the troops
3 Central Powers players - all playing Germans, faced off against a tripartite Allied force comprising British, Belgians and French.
German Jaegers and French infantry go bump in the night. What followed was...messy
The objective - a German artillery piece in the centre of the Battlefield.
For the German players - deliver the change to the fire plan and defend the gun.
For the British - capture the maps (showing the locations of the other guns in the battery) and spike the gun.
We used "To the Last Man" rules which I may review later but suffice it to say that they provided a

My very first game ever of this airplane combat game, and I took some pictures to go with it as usual...It was at last weekend's TSA Openday that I sat down with Albert, and indulged myself in this fast play game.I took command of the Sopwith Camel of Belgian aviator Olieslagers (his statue btw is outside Antwerp Airport) and faced of against an infamous German threedecker.I started with some swivveling manoeuvres to errrrm, confuse my opponent.Both fighters closed as firing range came closer and closer...And then my navigator bid the dust (and I learned I needed to put them face down).We both circled wide after the intitial pass, ready to go nose to nose again...And my guns strafed a critical point, as the German plane exploded in a ball of fire. My plane got one additional damage in the pass for the record.This is a fun little game to be honest, and maybe one I might get a few planes for if I find them at a bargain stall or something...

Back in 2015 about 100 New Zealand wargamers volunteered to take part in the nation’s official World War One centennial commemoration by participating in a crowd project to paint over 5000 specially sculpted 54mm figures for a massive diorama of &he

The other night a few of the lads got together for a WW1 game.Rules used were Bolt Action.Figures are 20mm from Brad's collection.The battle was based around a British force sent to capture a German occupied town. German artillery quickly b...

Wartime Miniatures have released their long awaited 1/72nd scale pilots for WW1, these will fit into most if not all model aircraft on the market. Four different pilot options with mixed clothing combinations will give enough variation for any Jasta le...

Last week my buddy Christian gave me a tank to paint for his new project: Flames of War, WW1, a supplement that allows FOW to take their game back from WW2 to the Great War. There are a modest amount of models available and I got to paint one of them, ...